The objectives of this project are to develop new methods for intramolecular oxidative phenol coupling, and to use them in the synthesis of several important alkaloids. The natural products to be synthesized are members of the Amaryllidaceae, aporphine, morphine, and colchicine classes of alkaloids; all of these are alkaloids of considerable pharmacological interest. It is hoped that the end results of this project will be to make the above compounds and analogs thereof more readily accessible, and to provide new general reactions and techniques for use in organic chemistry.